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Tuesday, March 6, 2012

Mount Mayon in Albay is one of the many active volcanoes in the Philippines, has always been a favorite among Filipinos because of its perfect cone. As the year 2009 was about to end, she started to act up. We decided to drive south from Manila to the province of Bicol, where Mount Mayon resides, to be able to capture the anger of the beautiful Mayon.

Monday, February 13, 2012

The fine folks at Uppercase published an article about my work in Uppercase 11 and they chose my work for the cover! This issue came out in December, I'm just getting around to posting it. If you're interested you can find back issues on their website and Anthropologie carries them in North America.

This is a beautiful magazine, full of wonderful articles and project tutorials. Get yours now, issue 12 is out now. The green insert is an advert, it's paper that has seeds embedded in the pulp. I'm going to plant it come spring. I've found something that delighted me in every issue, like this seed paper.You can subscribe or buy back issue HERE.

Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Here are a few images of the gold treasure found in the Philippines. There were belts of pure gold, gold masks, gold daggers, gold ornaments, bowls, bracelets, rings, pectorals, earrings, and a pure gold rope that turned out to be a sacred thread and weighs 400 kilos, so intricately designed that one could just stare at it in wonder. I got the few images but not all.

Dagger Handle

A dagger handle from the Surigao Treasure. The swirling lines and the asymmetric form suggest raging flames surrounding a bird's head with a disk at the tip of its long beak. In Indonesia, the garuda or sun-bird was the god Vishnu's vehicle. In old Philippine languages, the sun was also called hari, or king. The symbolism here, then, is that the Butuan kings were vehicles of the divine.

Facial Covers

Scribed swirls and waves on headbands and facial covers from Butuan inspired by waves or the niaga, the snake or dragon motif, which symbolized the sea, which the ancient Filipinos mastered. The abstract pattern expresses the dynamism of ancient Philippine civilization. Those patterns and motifs survive in the southern Philippine okir design tradition. Artisans used a stylus -- perhaps just a pointed bamboo stick -- to scribe the patterns on the hammered sheet.

Gold bowl from the Surigao treasure

Ear ornament discovered in Arasasan in Mindanao.

Below are the other pictures of the gold ornament discover in Surigao. The man who allegedly found these valuable pieces of treasure sold some of them and left most of the treasure to a priest in their parish. Eventually, these gold pieces found their way to the Ayala Museum and the Central Bank of the Philippines.

Philippines is known of many treasures found from people in any place of the country. The most famous is the finding of Mr. Rogelio Rojas, a former Filipino soldier who had worked as a locksmith before allegedly discovering in a cave north of Manila a hidden chamber full of gold bars and a giant golden Buddha statue.

Lots of people hunting the Yamashita treasure anywhere in the Philippines. Some found the gold, and many of them are not lucky.

In 1981, Mr. Berto Morales, a farmer working as a bulldozer operator in an irrigation project in Surigao struck gold. He discovered a treasure trove of gold ornaments while bringing down a hill to collect filling materials.

According to the Probe documentary film, the treasures were discovered in an excavation site in Surigao. There were belts of pure gold, gold masks, gold daggers, gold ornaments, bowls, bracelets, rings, pectorals, earrings, and a pure gold rope that turned out to be a sacred thread or "sablay" and weighs 400 kilos, so intricately designed that one could just stare at it in wonder. The man who allegedly found these valuable pieces of treasure sold some of them and left most of the treasure to a priest in their parish. Eventually, these gold pieces found their way to the Ayala Museum and the Central Bank of the Philippines.

After Probe's documentary, I made it a point to search more about the gold of our ancestors. What I found is something important to me since I never learned this in school. We were taught that the Spaniards came here for the spices. Maybe it is partly true but there is more to spices. I actually found a blog that proposes that the Philippines is actually a gold-rich land. In some of the accounts made by the colonizers, they described our ancestors as adorned with gold from head to toe. "Gold as big as eggs" could be found just "lying around." The king had gold in his teeth and ate in golden plates. Even his abode has pure gold as part of the structure. Wow!

Wednesday, January 11, 2012

Time flies really fast. I was there in Splash Island four years ago when im still single and love the place very much. Yesterday is different. Im taking my two-year old son to this wonderful waterworld. Children naturally love playing in water and I thought my son would enjoy this oasis, which is a few kilometers away from the concrete Metro Manila jungle. When it comes to water fun, I must say the Splash Island is one of the best in the Philippines today.

Splash Island Intrance

Anyway, should you intend to visit Splash Island, I suggest you immediately look for a table, hut or place where you could place your things. That’s necessary if you have a few bags with you, but you could always use the locker in case you have not much stuff with you. You can’t bring in water and food, so save yourself the hassle of bringing baon. When you’re ready to go enjoy, change into your swimming gear and take a shower at the Shower Room.

Agos Grandes at Splash Island

Here are some of the stops you may find interesting: Magellan’s Drop (mat-race ride; downhill slide with you on your belly), Rio Montanosa (also called family raft, the starting point is higher than the Magellan’s Drop, with bigger rafts enough to accommodate the entire family). If you want to warm up your butt and slide, take the Dos Supremos and the King Pilipit (both with no mat or rubber — just you and the slide). If you want to slide but prefer a rubber raft between the surface and your behind, take the Big Bam Boo and the Twisted Palms. If you just want to sit around and imagine that you’re at the beach, try the Agos Grandes, a swimming pool with waves.

Splash Island is not entirely for the teens and adults. Children could also run around and enjoy at the Water Wahoo, although it’s not unusual to see adults also enjoying the place. At the back of Water Wahoo are water slides for children (Twin Coco Knot and Curl-of-the-Orient). I thought my son would be afraid of the slides, but here he is enjoying the kiddie slide (and subsequently came to conquer the tallest slide — the Rio Montanosa).

All the activities will definitely make you hungry, so either buy food from the stalls around the place or at the main foodcourt — Fiesta sa Pulo (among the outlets at the food court is Kenny Roger’s Roasters). After eating, relax a bit by floating around the entire area through the Balsa River. Grab a “raft,” then just go with the flow around the entire place.

Splash Island is not open throughout the year, most probably because the revenue is not enough to cover the operating costs during the rainy season. Splash Island is open only between March and June. This year, I heard they will operate only until June 15, in time for the start of classes.

How much. Admission fee is different in weekdays and weekends. During weekdays, admission fee is P250 for adults and P200 for children/senior citizens.

On weekends, admission fee is P325 for adults and P250 for children/senior citizens.

Saturday, January 7, 2012

Elin Nordegren, Tiger Wood ex-wife bulldozes $12 million home. There are times when divorce forces people to do strange things. Burn sheets. Throw out clothes. Toss rings into the ocean. But when you get $100 million in your divorce, you can trump just about anything and that's what happened with Tiger Woods' ex-wife Elin Nordegren when she bought a $12 million home and bulldozed the whole thing.

Courtesy of Pacific Coast News

Yes, according to TMZ, Elin Nordegren bought a $12 million home in North Palm Beach, Fla., but didn't like it, and has plowed the whole thing.

The house, which had six bedrooms and eight bathrooms, is now just rubble, with no word yet on what is going to replace the beautiful building you see above, but I guess when you have nine figures in the bank, it doesn't really matter what you want.

A comments from yahoo news says:

This story makes me sick to my stomach. What a waste! There are millions of people in this country who can barely make their rent or mortgage payments each month and this woman bulldozes a perfectly good $12 million home. What a crazy world this is. Yahoo news